Byzantine Blog

To Brussels Only With Kosovo-Metohija Included

In Christmas interview with Belgrade daily Vecernje novosti, Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica stressed that the Stabilization and Association Agreement (SAA) Serbia initialed and was prepared to sign with the European Union on January 28, clearly and categorically guaranteed Serbia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

While Serbia, as a party to this agreement, is prepared to strictly abide by all its stipulations, the other side, the EU, has “unfortunately, announced even before the Agreement is signed, it intends to breach it,” Premier Kostunica said.

“Namely, the EU intends to reach an unlawful decision to send its mission to Kosovo and Metohija, in order to start implementing the rejected Ahtisaari plan for ‘supervised independence’,” Kostunica said, adding that it is up to the European organization to choose whether it wants an Agreement with Serbia, or to dismember Serbia with its mission, since both are simply not possible.

“The decision is up to the EU. At the very instant they would decide to send the mission, the SAA would be breached, annulled and void. We do not wish for that, but we have no power to decide on behalf of the EU. In any case, I believe that not a single responsible politician in Serbia would ever give legitimacy or covert support to anyone, including the EU, to seize Kosovo,” Kostunica said.

Samardzic: Serbia—EU Relations in Serious Crisis

Kosovo-Metohija Minister Slobodan Samardzic on Friday assessed that relations between Serbia and EU are “in serious crisis,” since Brussels obviously does not want Serbia as a whole, but broken down to smaller bites.

“The EU has linked Serbia’s accession to European Union with its own intention, which will most probably later become a decision, to recognize the independence of Serbia’s southern province.

“We cannot ignore this fact, however strategically important the Stabilization and Association Agreement is for us,” Samardzic said.

Samardzic stressed that Belgrade should decisively reject a planned EU mission to the province because its implementation, “without previous agreement on the future status of Kosovo and without a corresponding UN Security Council resolution, would represent the violation of international law and a form of violence.”

“The EU Mission is part of Ahtisaari plan for ‘supervised independence’ of Kosovo province. This is the plan that was rejected not only by Serbia, but by the UN Security Council. It is incomprehensible that the EU is behaving this ignorantly towards the international law and its own constitutive acts, the EU Agreement and the EC Founding Agreement, all of which are strictly binding the organization to respect of the international law,” Samardzic said.

Concluding that Serbia cannot possibly enter into agreement with the EU at this point, Samardzic said:

“If the Union is prepared to accept the independence of Kosovo by violating international law, not to mention the violation of Serbia’s vital interests, how is it possible to imagine such complex contractual relations between the EU and Serbia as envisioned by the SAA? The Agreement was negotiated and initialed on firm conditions that the basic laws are respected and that, therefore, the SAA applies to the entire internationally recognized territory of Serbian state.”

Newsweek: Serbia Rejects EU

Someone at the Newsweek gets it.

Under the title Sorry, Not Interested, Michael Levitin explains that “Serbia's Parliament has overwhelmingly rejected any future EU-imposed mission in Kosovo, and stands with the support of Russia and a growing list of countries including China, Indonesia and South Africa in its refusal to part with the region—even, according to Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica, if it means shelving EU membership talks.”

“[...] Serbia, it seems, has flipped the tables on the EU. For the first time, a European country outside the EU is not clamoring to be let in, but, on the contrary, making demands of its own, insisting Europe continue negotiations over Kosovo until an agreeable solution to all parties is met. To the Serb on the street, it's a perfectly rational move. When they look toward the EU's newest members, Romania and Bulgaria, they see their neighbors, admitted in 2007, with crumbling infrastructure and a lower average monthly income than the Serbs themselves. In a recent poll, 75 percent of Serbs rejected giving up Kosovo in exchange for EU membership.

“Now Serbia is demanding Europe line up "with us or against us" on Kosovo, and a number of EU states are leaning Serbia's way. Those opposed to a unilateral Kosovo declaration of independence include Spain, Cyprus, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia and Greece. They argue that to forcibly separate the 90 percent ethnic Albanian and largely Muslim province from an unwilling Serbia will undermine stability in the Balkans and set a dangerous precedent for other separatist movements.”

Sorry, Not Interested article by Michael Levitin, Newsweek

Image Swedish anti-EU poster: “Why Not Try?”